


Five Wolves Who Couldn't Replace Lady

by MissKate



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Not For Arya Fans, Not for Ned Stark Fans, Queen in the North, not for Catelyn stark fans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-10
Updated: 2019-09-10
Packaged: 2020-10-14 03:13:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20593745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissKate/pseuds/MissKate
Summary: Five wolves who couldn't replace Lady, aka a series of mini-aus.Firstly, a wounded creature on the Trident changes Jeyne Poole's life.





	Five Wolves Who Couldn't Replace Lady

**Author's Note:**

> Jeyne Poole is an extremely biased, bratty pre-teen. She's turned up to eleven, and should be taken with an entire shaker of salt. She's also the POV character for the first story.

**Five Direwolves Sansa Didn’t Have**

  1. _Trident_

Sansa hadn’t stopped crying for hours. Not wild, angry sobs, just softly overflowing with tears, as if her eyes were too full. Arya, more spoilt and horse faced than ever, had scoffed at her sister over breakfast before taking off to compound her previous errors by playing with more peasants, no doubt.

Jeyne would have made a much better highborn lady than Arya. She might just make a noble marriage yet, she thought, wandering through the camp to the privy. Arya would have to marry some lord’s bastard, and no doubt she’d find that appealing. Or Lord Stark would continue to spoil her and let her wander around her whole life, getting underfoot and throwing mud at people.

Lord Stark, her thoughts took an even darker turn. He’d murdered Lady and never even apologized to Sansa. He’d murdered her because his friend’s wife had thrown a tantrum. Jeyne hadn’t particularly _liked_ Lady, but Lady had always been gentle and sweet, unlike certain other wolves, and Lord Stark had slaughtered her like a pig. He hadn’t even suggested going after Arya’s wicked beast. Arya had gotten away with carting around a killer pet, just like she’d gotten away with sneaking off, playing with sticks, and attacking the prince.

It was always like that. Sansa practiced her sewing, her dancing, her music, her manners, while Arya ran wild, poking at her sister, barely even tried to improve her stitches, and stole discarded weapons to play with. But all Sansa ever got from Lord Stark was an absentminded nod and smile, while he plainly adored Arya, even hiding smiles while he scolded her. It was completely unfair, always.

And now he’d killed Lady and was letting Arya’s wolf run wild in the woods, where she could savage anyone who came across her, smallfolk, noble, or one of the vague in between, like Jeyne and her father.

Jeyne sniffled, to her own horror, but she was suddenly so miserable over Sansa. If Jeyne went to her own father with a new piece of stitching, or showed him how she had learned a new song, she would get the same praise as her siblings. He knew her and was proud of her, even though she didn’t know one end of a spear from the other. He’d even let her tell him all her anger over Lord Stark’s cruelty last night, after Sansa had cried herself to sleep, before hushing her and reminding her of all they owed him. Sansa was still asleep, tears staining her face, and Jeyne had decided to go looking for water and linen cloths.

She slipped into an empty little clearing, and tried to compose herself. It wasn’t easy. She was so angry, and she always cried when she was angry, but she managed it eventually. She took a final deep breath, and wiped her eyes, before looking up, straight into soft, yellow eyes.

She squeaked, remembering that Arya’s untrained beast was free and might not have actually been driven off. Then she momentarily thought that perhaps Lord Stark was kinder than she’d thought, and he’d simply put Lady in the bushes here, planning for her to be spirited away.

But no, she’d seen them loading Lady’s body, still dripping with blood, into a wagon bound for Winterfell. Not only that, this wolf was bigger, much bigger, and had a thicker face and body, with reddish fur. He, she assumed it was a male, was also shyer, shrinking back against the trees and whining, ears pointing backwards.

For a moment, she feared being eaten, then she saw the bloody wound on the wolf’s leg.

“You’re-You’re hurt,” she whispered.

He cried again, and she felt sorry for him. He hadn’t asked to be discovered here, hadn’t asked for a whole camp of people to come and disturb his rest. She could see that the wound was bad, with pus and swelling. It reminded her of Lady. It reminded her of Lady’s wound, the blood that dripped from her fur.

“Stay here,” she begged, and ran back into camp.

Comfrey and clean linen was easy to get ahold of. The maester’s tent was empty, since he had to tend to the prince, and no one was guarding it.

But would the wolf even let her tend him? She didn’t know anything about animals.

“Jeyne, what are you doing?”

Sansa was still crying, Jeyne saw. She had clearly washed her face and dried her eyes at some point, but the tears were starting again.

Jeyne wondered if it was fair, what she was going to do. Sansa was still wounded, tears flowing like the blood from the wolf’s leg. But she knew animals. At least, she knew wolves. Lady had been a wild cub, once.

“Come with me?” She held out her hand to Sansa. “Please? I need your help.”

Sansa hesitated, then took her hand.

“Alright.”

…

They stole a pot of hot water and made a poultice ofthe comfrey. Sansa didn’t know how, but Jeyne’s mother had just made one a few seven days back, for her little brother. Sansa was still confused, but it was better than crying.

“Who are we giving this to?” Sansa asked, softly. “Is it for the prince?”

Jeyne would never have said it, but yesterday had soured her on the prince. If he’d been gallant as they’d thought, surely he would have spoken for Lady. But she didn’t say anything. Sansa would have to marry him, no matter what she said.

She led her to the little clearing. It was soft and still, and for a moment she thought the wolf had left, until Sansa gasped.

“Lady?” She asked, eyes brightening for a moment, then, “No.”

The wolf was still lying in the thicket, now panting softly. The wound was making him feverish, Jeyne thought.

They had a bucket of hot water, linens, and a poultice. Jeyne swallowed and went to the wolf’s side, only for him to snarl at her, almost sending her back on her ass. Her… Behind. Unmentionable.

“That’s enough,” Sansa scolded, twitching her skirts around Jeyne, hot water in hand. “Jeyne and I came here to help you, you needn’t be so rude.”

The wolf didn’t exactly look ashamed, but he bowed his head to Sansa’s scolding, and, Jeyne suspected, his own exhaustion. He lay still, trembling, as they both approached, his breath high and soft.

“Now, you must be very brave,” Sansa put down the water and sat, taking the wolf’s head in her lap, which it was much too big for, and wrapping her arms around his neck. “Jeyne is going to doctor you, and it will hurt, but you’ll feel much better after, and you mustn’t bite or growl.”

No one, Jeyne suspected, knew how very brave Sansa was. Jeyne was terrified and she was nowhere near the huge sharp teeth of the beast, and Sansa was kissing and caressing him as if he were a kitten.

But it seemed to work. The wolf sobbed and whimpered, and when Jeyne wiped the pus out of the cut he closed his eyes tightly and seemed to stop breathing, but he never growled, or so much as bared his teeth again. Jeyne put the poultice on, and carefully tied the bandages, not too loose, but not so tight that he couldn’t chew it off himself if necessary.

“There you are,” Sansa cooed, when Jeyne sat back, sweating and weary. “How brave you were, my dear wolf.”

The monstrous wolf yipped in response, licking Sansa’s cheek like a puppy, clearly already feeling better, then turned on Jeyne, knocking her down and covering her with his rough, red fur, before hopping up, and running around and out of the clearing.

Sansa watched him go, beaming, until he was out of sight, and Jeyne saw her friend’s face darken, like clouds passing the sun.

“He’s free,” she muttered, and Jeyne, not knowing what else to do, wrapped an arm around the other girl’s shoulder.

…

They left the Trident and continued south. Jeyne thought that the Southern lands were nice for a change, but they were overly bright, the sun shimmering green and gold through the trees, the streams and rivers glittering blue and flashing silvery-white, bright flowers everywhere. It was pretty, but Jeyne hoped they wouldn’t need to stay here.

But then, she might get married before they went back, and then she’d have to get used to it.

Sansa was waiting for her when they finally stopped for the night. She stood in her shimmering grey cloak and nodded impatiently to the brush on the outskirts of the camp.

“Look!” She hissed.

It took Jeyne a moment to see it, but when she did, she couldn’t look away. The wolf was barely hidden by the leaves and their shadows, his golden eyes focused directly on them.

She found herself grinning at Sansa, and they ran for the trees together, little caring if someone thought them too impatient for the closed stool.

The wolf was waiting in the trees, and almost threw himself at Sansa, whining at her like a puppy, wriggling impatiently for pats. Jeyne inspected his bandages, and took them off, as they were fairly clean, but dusty.

“The air will probably be better for him now,” she told Sansa, and was surprised to hear her mother’s words coming out of her own mouth. “Once it makes a scab, it should heal up with nothing more than a scar.”

“Did you hear that, Trident?” Sansa cooed. “You lucky, lucky pup. Jeyne’s fixed you up better than a maester!”

Jeyne flushed, going an ugly red. Sansa had somehow gotten lucky, despite her red hair and pale skin, so when she blushed, it was pale, pink roses blooming under her cheeks. Then Sansa’s words reached her brain.

“You named him?” She asked. It didn’t seem like a very good idea. The wolf had probably only followed them to get the bandages off, and it was a grown beast, not an orphaned pup.

“Yes,” Sansa nodded, and patted the wolf’s head, scratching his ears. “He was born there, where Lady…”

Jeyne had to tamp down some anger at Lord Stark again.

“It’s a lovely name,” she told Sansa, and, amazed at her own boldness, she stroked Trident’s back.

The were silent for a time, concentrating on Trident.

“He’s so big,” Sansa said, finally. “Do you-do you think Lady would have gotten this big?”

Lady would have been much bigger, Jeyne thought. Trident wasn’t a direwolf, after all, he was an ordinary creature, and Lady had been petted and cosseted nearly her entire short life.

She shrugged, instead of answering, and they sat silently together with Trident until Jeyne’s father came looking for them.

…

That was how they spent all their evenings, and some early mornings, until King’s Landing came into view, and she and Sansa bade Trident farewell, blinking back tears.

“You mustn’t come into the city,” Sansa bade the wolf, speaking as if he were a thinking creature, despite how she had only yesterday been teaching him to sit and to bow on command. “Understand, Trident?”

He huffed and kissed her hand, but when they went down the long, dusty road, he didn’t follow them. At least, not where they could see him.

…

King’s Landing was, in most ways, wonderful. Jeyne was ostensibly there to serve Sansa, but Sansa, as always, served Jeyne just as much, helping with her hair and helping her embroider her dresses more extravagantly. She couldn’t wear the same colours, or the rich silks and velvets, but Sansa insisted that they could embroider her skirts and they would come off just as well.

Jeyne fell decidedly in love with Ser Beric Dondarrion. He was a nice, safe sort of first love, she decided, and even though Sansa thought her rather silly for it, she didn’t care. Sansa was trying her best to make everything well with the prince, and according to her, all was well on its way to her and Joffrey’s golden rule, which would start a new age of peace and prosperity, but Jeyne could see the tightness around her mouth and eyes.

Of course, Arya was as spoiled and poorly behaved as ever, often showing up in boy’s clothes, covered in dust. She and Lord Stark seemed to think that none of this reflected on Sansa at all, as if her disgraceful conduct had no affect on how the Queen and the prince would view her behaviour in light of Arya’s.

Sansa swung like a pendulum between agreeing with Jeyne that Arya’s behaviour was atrocious, and seeming determined to ignore her. She and Jeyne spent more and more time together, at court, with the Prince(who seemed to have improved somewhat) and with other young courtiers. Jeyne was included as a matter of course, since Sansa never let anyone leave her out.

Sometimes they had time just for themselves. They could take their sewing to the garden. It had clean, well maintained benches and chairs, so one could sit in the sun and not have to worry about getting dirty, or dealing with annoying flies.

“I had a dream about Trident last night,” Sansa said one day, apropos of nothing. She was embroidering her family’s sigil onto the hem of a new dress, in silver thread.

“A good dream?” Jeyne worried she might have had nightmares. She’d had them the first night in the city, crying out for Lord Stark to stop, and pleading in turn for him to spare Lady, then Trident.

Sansa nodded, smiling.

“We were running together in the woods,” she explained. “We even jumped into the sea and swam around, and lay looking out at some great city, that sparkled on a distant shore, like someone had spilled a handful of jewels.”

Jeyne remembered that Sansa had used to write poetry. Jeyne had tried, but had only made herself and her brothers laugh. Sansa’s had been lovely, all about flowers and stars and knights and ladies. She had even written a song that they’d sung together, quietly, in Sansa’s room, while Sansa tapped out the tune on the bells.

Sansa hadn’t written poetry since Lady had died.

“I hope he’s out there swimming and looking at cities, then,” she told Sansa. “Just as long as he doesn’t try to go into one.”

It was a poor joke, but it made Sansa laugh and look a bit less dreamy, which was how Jeyne liked her. She kept dreaming of Trident, though, and told Jeyne of the dreams. Jeyne worried about it at first, then decided it was just Sansa seeking what peace she could find in sleep, to escape the excitement of court.

Then Lady Stark took Tyrion Lannister prisoner.

It was like the time that Lady Stark had decided Gwennie Daffys had stolen the wax candles from Maester Luewin’s study, had her whipped and sent home in disgrace, only for it to turn out that the Maester had, as he himself had said, misplaced them. It hadn’t done Gwennie any good. The girl was too frightened to ever return, and had taken a position at a brothel in Wintertown, claiming she was treated better as a maid of all work there than in any placement in Winterfell.

Lord Stark hadn’t even known about it for moons, not until Lady Stark had tried it again, and Tor, the stableboy she’d accused of stealing Lord Robb’s dagger, had gone straight to him, refusing to lose his place, or be sent to the Wall. Or worse.

After the matter had been cleared up, and the missing dagger found to have fallen behind a shelf, Lord Stark had taken a bag of dragons to Gwennie’s, and had to give it to her mother after the girl had hidden in her mother’s henhouse. Gwennie’s mother had bobbed a curtsey and kept her other children firmly behind her skirts, according to Jory.

Jeyne had been eight at the time, and had known better, even then, than to complain to Sansa about it, known how precarious her place as Sansa’s companion was. Her own mother had gone about the place for days with tight lipped smiles that never reached her eyes anytime she saw Lady Stark, and talked at night, when she thought Jeyne was asleep, about poor, simple Gwennie’s backside and legs.

Sansa hadn’t mentioned it for two weeks, then she’d given Jeyne a grey scarf, with birds embroidered on the ends, for Gwennie.

“Mother didn’t mean it,” she had said, before trailing off, troubled. Even at eight, Jeyne had known that Sansa had to stand with her mother, her pretty, tall mother, that older men and women still called “Lord Stark’s foreigner lady”, as if she hadn’t suffered through the same winters they all had. Lady Stark, who had helped Jeyne learn her letters, smiling as proudly over her first shaking attempts as if she’d been Jeyne’s own mother, even though a steward’s girl couldn’t really hope for much higher than a place as a lady’s handmaid, or a hedge knight’s wife, and didn’t need an education.

She’d given the scarf to her father to give to Gwennie, and Gwennie had been married in it, pretty as a picture, beaming in the Godswood near her own home. It was still her most prized possession, and she often told how “Little Lady Sansa” had given it to her.

And the thing was, Lady Stark _hadn’t_ meant it. She’d been as appalled as anyone, and sincerely remorseful, a fact that hadn’t really done Gwennie, or the stableboy, any good. And she wasn’t cruel, or stingy, kindly sharing Septa Mordane’s teachings with Jeyne and Beth. She gave liberally to the poor, and spent much of her rare spare time sewing or knitting for charity. If she was never warm or kind to Jon Snow, she didn’t send him away, or treat him too cruelly.

It was just that she was like Arya that way, leaping to the solution, and making the facts fit to it, the same as Arya assuming that Sansa was laughing at her sewing, or that Prince Joffrey had murdered her peasant friend, as if people didn’t drown every day.

And she wasn’t even very cruel. Lord Bolton would have taken Gwennie’s hand, and a few other lords and ladies would have had her horsewhipped, or hanged. The stableboy would have been strung up, or long since sent to the wall.

It was only that she did this, and then she never had to clean it up. Lord Stark took Gwennie those dragons, gave young Tor a heifer for his mother, and now he was trying to claim that it was his idea that Lord Tyrion had been kidnapped and carried up into the Vale. It was wicked because it was careless, which Jeyne’s mother claimed was the worst sort of wickedness.

Sansa was, behind her grief for Jory, and concern for her father, terrified, both for her family and her future.

“I shouldn’t worry too much,” Jeyne tried to comfort her. “The queen doesn’t seem to like Lord Tyrion very much.”

That didn’t help Sansa at all, and Jeyne complained to her father, who shook his head.

“It doesn’t matter to the nobles if she doesn’t like him,” he explained. “It’s the North and the Riverlands and maybe the Vale insulting the Westerlands., or that’s how they see it.”

And the insult had gotten Jory killed and hurt Lord Stark’s leg, Jeyne thought, bitterly. And Sansa’s betrothal was in jeopardy, the betrothal she’d worked her whole life for, which meant Jeyne’s future, the marriage she might make as the hand-maiden to a princess, was in jeopardy. And on top of all that, if this insult spread beyond those lands, the Seven Kingdoms could easily slide into war.

Sansa was out of favour with the queen, which meant that she and Jeyne spent much of their time alone. Sansa became sluggish, to the displeasure of her Septa, and sullen with Arya and Lord Stark. She slept late, and napped during the day, eating and drinking less and less, and Jeyne wondered over heat sickness and consumption.She and Septa Mordane were in perfect agreement in giving Sansa mint teas and cool soups, plying her with peaches from the Reach and with oranges and lemons.

Lord Stark went, in Jeyne’s eyes, from slightly absent to a true fool one day, when Sansa came in, sobbing that he was breaking her betrothal and had given her, in its place, a doll. He hadn’t even noticed her misery, and was bribing her with an infant’s toys.

“He thinks me a child!” She wept. “Next he’ll give me lemon cakes and milk, and a wet-nurse!”

“No, no,” Septa Mordane tried to soothe Sansa, but Jeyne privately thought she was right. Lord Stark was too busy making sure Arya had her dancing master(not that Jeyne personally thought anything could improve Arya’s dancing. She had about five left feet) and her stupid boy’s clothes to care about how he was ruining her and Sansa’s lives.

Sansa fell asleep, and Jeyne and Septa Mordane worried together over it.

“She’s been sleeping too much and eating too little,” the septa ran a hand over Sansa’s hair. “Jeyne, help me take down her hair. Mayhaps if we loosen these braids and twists-“

Just as they began to pull out the tightly pinned hair, Sansa stiffened in her sleep, and cried out, her eyes opening, but rolled back so only the whites showed. She suddenly writhed, and sounds like the growling and snarling of wolves came from her throat. Jeyne found herself frozen, thinking of how Lady had looked as they loaded her, dripping red, into the cart.

“Fetch a maester, Jeyne!” Septa Mordane held Sansa down and in place, and Jeyne forced herself to run, braids flying behind her.

“Lady Sansa is ill!” She ran into her own people, Northerners, and tugged at their arms. “We need a maester, quickly! She’s fainted, and-And!”

If she said it was a fit, the word would spread through the land, Jeyne thought, and hoped a faint would be enough.

It seemed it was. The men ran, one with her, the other in the opposite direction, calling for a maester. Jeyne thought of gentle, discreet Maester Luwen, and wanted to cry with a sudden homesickness.

The maester who came wasn’t the grandmaester, whoever that was. Just a young maester, who patted her shoulder reassuringly, with a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. He was worried and Jeyne was shut out, guarding the door from curiosity seekers and Arya.

Jeyne’s father came with Sansa’s, and Jeyne was in no mood to watch him pretend to care for his eldest daughter.

“You’re not needed here, my lord,” she informed him, planting her feet as firmly as she could in front of the door.

Jeyne’s father frowned, and motioned for her to move.

“Do you think she wet herself?” Arya asked, carelessly excited. “I heard that when Robin Arryn has fits he wets himself.”

“Arya!” Lord Stark, for today was a day of horrors and miracles, turned and scolded his younger daughter as he seldom did. Arya sobered, as if she finally understood that someone other than herself existed in this world.

“Jeyne,” Lord Stark had a kindly look on his face. “I am pleased with your care for my daughter, but I really must insist-“

“Don’t pretend you care about her!” Jeyne had had enough of this. Sansa was in there, ill, possibly dying, and she didn’t need him hovering about, in the maester’s way. “You’ve been ignoring her ever since you left Winterfell! You broke her engagement, you killed her dire wolf, and you think a _doll_ will make up for it!”

She found herself yelling, and pointing at Arya.

“She’s been sick for days! And all you’re worried about is Lady Horseface’s dancing master! You never care about anything Sansa does! Sansa works so hard, she practices everything until it’s perfect, but if it’s not fighting or getting into people’s way, it means nothing, doesn’t it?” Her father’s face was ashy-white and she’d gone too far, farther than she’d ever intended to, but she couldn’t stop. “Sansa’s the perfect lady, and she’d be a perfect queen, but you don’t care about it at all! You don’t even care that your wife has ruined Sansa’s dreams, just like she tried to ruin Gwennie and Tor! She’s started a war! But I suppose you’ll hand a gift over to the Lannisters, and it’ll be as if Sansa’s life wasn’t ruined and Jory never died!”

“Ned!”

Lord Stark’s name rang in a clear baritone from outside, a roar of laughter accompanying it. The king was used to being obeyed, even in his cups.

“Tell the king,” Lord Stark didn’t look away from Jeyne and she found herself unable to break her gaze, either. It was as if someone other than herself were speaking, were standing there, were looking Lord Stark in the eyes and not backing down. “Tell the king I will be with him once I am assured that my daughter has recovered from her illness.”

Someone disappeared from the cloud of people around them.

“If she’s even really sick,” Arya muttered, and Lord Stark closed his eyes.

“Arya,” he said, and Arya made a face.

“I’m only saying!” She whined. “She’s probably just faking because she doesn’t want to leave!”

Jeyne’s whole world went red for a moment.

“You ugly little-“

She never finished, because her own father stepped in and slapped her.

“That’s enough from you, Jeyne,” he spoke softly, but she could see he was disappointed.

In her! For defending her lady!

Lord Stark stepped around her and her father, and opened the door.

The maester was holding Sansa’s wrist, counting. Her eyes were still rolled back, and she was unbearably stiff, still growling. Jeyne felt tears prick at her eyes.

“Sansa!” Arya ran in, and Jeyne wanted to strangle her, but for once, the girl didn’t move like a bull in rut. She took Sansa’s hand, gently, and called her name again.

“Wake up!” Arya begged. “Wake up! Sansa!”

“How is my daughter?” Lord Stark’s voice was horribly soft, the way it had been after Bran’s fall.

“She may recover, my lord,” the maester’s voice was horribly matter of fact and gentle. “However, until she regains consciousness, or at least until the fit ends, we cannot know the extent of the damage.”

“Ned!”

The king had come huffing and puffing up the stairs, Jeyne saw, from the corner of her eyes.

Sansa suddenly relaxed, and lay still, as in a deep sleep.

“Wake up, Sansa!” Arya seemed encouraged, and leaned in and kissed her. “Wake up, and I’ll beg pardon and eat lemon cakes with you!”

Sansa turned her head, and frowned.

“Lady,” she murmured. “Lady, no!”

Lord Stark looked as if he wanted to die.

“Ned, what-What ails the girl?”

The king burst in, stinking of wine and covered in blood. Jeyne winced from the stench, and waited for him to yell and demand and make everything circle around him.

“It’ll be alright, Ned,” the king said, looking awkward and afraid. “She’s only-“

Then something burst through all the people crowded at the door, past the Stark men and the king’s men, past an awkward looking Lannister boy with his half empty wine skin, and past Jeyne and her father. It gave Lord Stark and the king a wide berth, and clambered up onto the bed, flinging its huge, fur-covered self as close to Sansa as it could, and giving Jeyne a familiar, toothy grin.

“Get off there, you monster!”

The king was laughing and put out his hand to Trident, who’d grown to the length of a small horse, with the promise of further growing to come. The wolf sneezed politely, and pressed himself closer to Sansa. Arya laughed, and rubbed the wolf’s head, which he tolerated, even as he shared an exasperated sigh with Jeyne.

“He came upon me in the woods!” The king was grinning, like a boy who’d taught his pup a new trick. “Came right between me and a boar, just before it got me in the gut. Then he followed me home, and, well, here he is, I suppose.”

Trident was kissing Sansa, and whining. Sansa turned, and smiled, opening her eyes.

“Trident,” she said, and wrapped her arms around the wolf’s neck. “I haven’t woken up.”

“Sansa,” Lord Stark tried to move towards his daughters, but Trident raised his head and showed his teeth, growling.

“Don’t!” Sansa seemed to wake up all of a sudden, throwing herself between Trident and Lord Stark. “Don’t hurt him, Father! Go away!”

That, more than Trident’s growls, made Lord Stark stop, pulling back with a pained look on his face. He deserved it, Jeyne thought uncharitably, her cheek still stinging.

“No one’s going to hurt the wolf,” the king said, face red with more than wine. “I came to beg pardon, Ned. From you and your girls.”

Trident had pressed himself back down as soon as Lord Stark had pulled away, and now he only moved enough that he was simply pushing Sansa to lie back down, and leaning his head into Arya’s scratching.

“Ah, excellent!” The maester took the wine skin from the protesting Lannister boy, looking absently pleased. “This will need to be dissolved into wine to be affective, although it may not be necessary, given the lady’s recovery. Still, it can’t do any harm.”

He began to pour the wine into a small, clay cup, leaning forward to look into it, then stopped, wincing.

“Your grace drank this wine while hunting?” He asked, suddenly. He was eyeing it dubiously now.

“Had a little too much,” the king looked embarrassed.

“Frankly, your grace,” the maester’s voice was as dry as Dorne. “If you’d had a bit too much of this, we’d be planning your son’s coronation.”

Jeyne watched them all, King Robert, Lord Stark, and the unknown maester, turn to stare at the young Lannister. Jeyne didn’t know his name, but Sansa did.

“Lord Lancel?”

At that gentle voice, the boy near burst into tears, and began speaking.

…

If it hadn’t been for Jeyne’s father, the king might have killed his wife. It was when he was ranting and raving, Trident growling and barking to try to quiet him, Lord Stark trying to calm him by distraction, that Vayon Poole, soft voice cutting through the chaos like a knife, spoke like a man possessed.

“Why should your wife have been faithful to you, your grace?” He looked as if he were nauseated by his own daring. “You’ve been unfaithful to her, with everyone from ladies to tavern wenches, you’re a drunk and lecher, to the point where the lowest smallwoman would be blameless in divorcing you. It’s only a surprise that she bore three bastards, instead of ten.”

Then he had turned the colour of mashed turnips and thrown up in a vase that had apparently been in the Tower of the Hand since the Conquest, making a maid cry.

Lord Stark began to apologize, but the king waved him off.

“He’s done nothing but say plain truth, I suppose.”

The king sat down, and changed from a mountain of rage to a plain, unhappy man. Jeyne thought of Lyo back home, huge and happy, often drunk, and said to be as good a warrior as a lover.

The king, she thought, would have been happier as a plain man, a trapper like Lyo, free to drink and to love as he liked.

“Send her to the Silent Sisters, your grace,” the maester suggested. “Then return her children to her family.”

“Yes,” the king stood up, looking slightly more manly. “Then Lannister can cancel the Crown’s debt, and we’ll consider the matter ended.”

“What about the father?” Someone asked, and the entire party left, bursting into noise again on their way out.

Sansa was falling asleep again, with Trident and Arya curled up next to her, but when Jeyne tucked the covers up to her chin and made to leave, she grabbed Jeyne’s hand, a slightly nervous look on her face. Jeyne looked at her father, but he shook his head, refusing to leave.

“I dreamed I was Trident,” Sansa hissed. “I dreamed I was hunting, and I saw the boar and the king. I knew the king would die, and I made-I made Trident save him. I can still taste the blood in my mouth.”

And there was blood on Trident’s lips.

Jeyne shivered, then smiled at her friend.

“Trident saved the king,” she told her friend, wishing she felt as firm as she sounded. “Whatever happened, that can only be for the good.”

Sansa fell asleep after that, and Jeyne and her father left.

Vayon Poole was silent the whole way back to their quarters, where he collapsed on his bed.

“We’re ruined,” he moaned. “All those years, I held my tongue when Ned forced his wife to keep his bastard, I held it when little Sansa cried for loneliness, I held it when he made for her to marry a monster. And now!”

Jeyne went to take his hand and say something kindly, reassuring, but he just took her in his arms, in a kind of crazed embrace.

“I’m sorry, Jeynie,” he wept. “I’m so sorry.”

…

But as it happened, all his fears and tears were for less than nothing. The king had been impressed by his boldness, and, overnight, Jeyne found herself going from the daughter of the Steward of Winterfell(which she had always been quite proud of) to the daughter of the Hand of the King, with a dowry to match and a young Septa of her own, as the king gave, in exchange for her father’s service, lands and titles.

Lord Stark told her father afterwards that he had suggested Vayon for the job, seeing as how being the Hand might be thankless, but it was necessary, and it wasn’t very much different from being a steward.

It meant they had to stay in the south, but, Jeyne reasoned, she might always return North when she married.

The Queen and her children fled, but not before Joffrey fell in an unfortunate accident from a tower. He died in his sleep. Cersei Lannister and her remaining children were apprehended at the docks and Myrcella and Tommen Waters were quietly and mercifully made wards of the king, while Jaime Lannister was glad to take the Black and head North with the Night’s Watch recruits. Old Lord Lannister died when he heard the news, the new Lord Lannister said, by the same letter that pleaded for his sister and brother’s life and pledged his devotion.

They said that Cersei went mad after Joffrey’s death, and clawed her own throat out. Jeyne felt a bit sorry for her, but mostly she thought the woman and her paramour were selfish and stupid and the world was well rid of them.

Edric Storm had been brought to the Red Keep, quickly legitimized, and was being trained in the ways of ruling. Sansa was quiet on the subject of marriage.

Jeyne liked him. He was sweet and, aside from his unfortunate ears, quite handsome. Furthermore, he was brave and good and humble.

“He is all that,” Sansa agreed. “But he hasn’t met Trident. Or me.”

Jeyne made the arrangements, between fittings for a new silk gown and lessons in courtly etiquette. Her Septa was a quiet, dignified woman, who knew the new art of hook-stitching, and had written a book on the lives of holy ladies, and was glad to help arrange for Edric and Sansa to meet by “accident” in the garden.

He wasn’t a bit afraid of Trident, but he didn’t seem to see Sansa at all. Arya had accompanied her, her fright over Sansa’s sickness having made her vow to make better attempts at manners. She was wearing a lavender tunic over neat breeches and had tied her hair in ribbons of the same colour, and she was walking on the edge of a fountain while Sansa embroidered a new hood.

Edric was entranced. Trident sneezed at Edric and shook out his fur in dismissal.

So it was all a waste of time after all.

Well, at least Sansa had Trident.

…


End file.
